Month: July 2017

The important issue was raised in this article “Alzheimer’s and dementia are a necessary part of the conversation about Donald Trump” in “Palmer Report”, see the copy below. The evaluation of the cognitive functions should be quantitative and measurable, from the simple clinical tests to extensive psychological testing, if needed. So far I did not notice any significant cognitive deficits or problems. Sleep can affect cognition, and it looks like he suffers from chronic insomnia, the causes of which may be many, but depression is quite frequently the cause, and it is likely in his case. Irritability, anger, rage, verbal and Twitter venting, etc. might also be the symptoms of depression to which he might be constitutionally (hereditarily, genetically) predisposed. His mother looks somewhat depressed in the old photos. His affective instability, if it has a lifelong pattern, and that’s how it looks like, might fit into the clinical impressions of cyclothymic or dysthymic personality traits or disorders, but they are not disabling in and by themselves. Trump was a boxer in his youth, and the head traumas or post-concussion syndrome are a possibility, but I do not know enough about his medical history to make the impression about the roles of these factors.

Generally speaking, a psychological testing, including the tests for the cognitive functions, together with the other tests, like a head MRI, would be a very good idea, if he agrees to them, but no one can force him to take these tests. Although it might be beneficial for him politically if it clears any doubts about his mental state, and most definitely this information would be beneficial for him health wise, as a clinical evaluation. R. Reagan did have the subtle symptoms long before he developed the full blown dementia.

If you’ve ever watched a loved one suffer through a disease that caused severely diminished mental capacity, you know how tragic and devastating it can be. For that reason, diseases such as Alzheimer’s and dementia are generally spoken about with great care. They’re also arguably not spoken about often enough, out of rightful fear of being offensive. But when it comes to the ongoing and evolving conversation about Donald Trump, it’s well past time to acknowledge the obvious.It would be counterproductive, not to mention grossly unfair to those who do suffer from these diseases, for us to arbitrarily accuse someone like Donald Trump of suffering from a disease like Alzheimer’s and dementia simply because we have a low opinion of him to begin with. But based on the rapidly deteriorating cognitive function that Trump has begun displaying in recent months, the average layperson who’s been paying close attention has been able to see that he’s clearly suffering from some type of rapidly worsening condition.Trump often doesn’t appear to know where he’s at or to whom he’s speaking. He blankly wanders out of the room in the middle of press conferences and bill signings, seemingly with no idea of why he was supposed to have been there. He blankly wanders away from his own motorcade. He can’t be trusted to speak to groups of children. His spoken vocabulary is shrinking. He no longer appears to be writing his own tweets. His staff seems to be having a harder time covering for him by the day.So in addition to the numerous political arguments for why Trump isn’t fit for the job, based on everything from his extremism, to his lack of decency, to his election rigging, to his lifetime of financial crimes, to his obstruction of justice, we now have this more fundamental issue. Even if Trump had been doing a suitable job as president up to this point, his collapsing cognitive condition alone is enough to make the case for his removal by the 25th Amendment.

It’s time for us to begin talking out loud about the fact that Donald Trump is clearly suffering from Alzheimer’s and dementia or a similar condition. It’s time to get doctors, and those who have witnessed these diseases up close, to back us up on it. And we must do it in a respectful enough manner such that moderates will come around to seeing his deteriorating condition for themselves, rather than merely assuming that we’re trying to be mean to Trump because we don’t like him. After all, if President Obama had begun demonstrating these kinds of symptoms of rapidly collapsing cognitive function, we’d have had no choice but to call for his removal as well.

Trump has some positive qualities, to counterbalance the barrage of the broad criticism of him in the media:

He is a deal-maker, which implies flexibility and adaptability, and the search for the non-orthodox solutions.

He is a practical man to the core, to the bone; common sense is his flesh, blood, and soul. Putin called this trait of “beingconcrete“: “He is very concrete, he fully perceives his interlocutor [is able to take a measure of men, in his own system of coordinates – M.N.], and he analyzes and answers questions or new elements that come in the course of the discussion quickly enough,” Putin added.” To sum up, according to Putin’s impressions, he is fast and adequate in his reactions, perceptions, analysis, and evaluation of the situation and the players within the given, and the very here and now, “real” situation, context. It can be called the mechanical paradigm of political behavior: it might not be seen as very “sophisticated” or “refined” but this style of the characteristic for him, (“business like”), political behavior is “clear”, automatic, “instinctive”, reactional, and “exact” (like a fighter’s punch), and sometimes it can be amazingly adept, adroit, precise, and “prudent” in a predatorial context, “correct”, not without some artistic flair in delivery, and “efficient”. Just sometimes, and under the certain circumstances and in certain milieus. This paradigm might also be called “monarchical”: it is centered essentially around one person or a small group of persons in power. Nowadays, we would also call it “oligarchical”. Overall and most of the time, however, this political style and performance appear to be helpless, immature, improvisational, and which is worst of all, inefficient; in the present context.

Trump thinks and talks simply, and sometimes can be taken for a simpleton which he is not at all. This simplicity, that goes to the heart of the common man, is one of his greatest political assets and weapons. Twitter is his weapon’s platform. Nice. A new master-communicator for a new era. Very nice. Promoted by whom and by which Twitter bots, that’s the question.

I could list the other qualities too, but the unfortunate point is that the same qualities, and first of all his practicality, and the one-dimensional, “yes or no”, “black and white” simplicity, cause the great concern in his Russian affairs and his hypothetical Russian connections: they raise the suspicions that he would make a deal with the devil (the Russians in this instance) if it helps and saves his skin financially and politically, at the expense of the best interests of his country. That’s where the conflict and the dilemma is.

I am absolutely not interested in “transsexual issues”, including their service in the military. Let them serve if they want to, and if they are good and useful for the military. The whole issue is greatly blown out of proportions, and it is inherited from the Obama Administration, which was in its “noble search” for its great pseudo-liberal causes. As a matter of fact, I do not see it as the political, military, or the particularly “liberal” issue on the agenda. This issue has nothing to do with the political agenda, where it was inserted artificially; it has nothing to do with the human rights, or the Gay Liberation movement.

Many physicians and psychiatrists feel and think that it is entirely medical and psychiatric issue and cannot be treated as the item on the political agenda, and I agree with them. Many of them also think that these medically and psychiatrically complex issues cannot and should not be treated in a uniform fashion: one prescription or one “cut” for all, and I also agree with them.

Please, leave these complexities for the doctors to figure them out, the best they can. Give the transgender individuals the maximum of all the freedoms and the opportunities, including the military service, if they want to, and treat them just like any other individuals, and as they want to. But do not make the nonsensical and ridiculous “big issue” out of it, which it is not.

“They call themselves the Human ‘Rights’ Campaign as they take our rights away!” Dr. McHugh said. Noting that HRC is on the “warpath” against him, and “trying to send me down the memory hole,” he said, “I don’t think they can do too much to me.” He said he believes his position is safe at Johns Hopkins. And he remained confident that the media-hyped “fad” of transgenderism will fade as more and more Americans realize that performing radical operations on the bodies of self-described “transgender” men, women — and especially children — to match their confused “feelings” is “mistreatment.” “This craze is going to come apart, as crazes always do,” he said.

“…Tennessee mother who put her adopted 7-year-old son back on a plane to his home country of Russia. According to statistics from the federal Child Welfare Information Gateway, up to 10 percent of adoptions—and very possibly more—end in “disruption,” meaning the adoption process is halted after the child is placed in the home but before the paperwork is finalized…

The new report floats maternal substance abuse in pregnancy as another possible explanation, but emphasizes that it’s mere speculation, because in many cases too little information is known about birth parents.

In fact, “too little information” emerges as a major theme in both reports. The survey data Zill relied on show that many adoptive parents do not possess even rudimentary information about the family backgrounds of their children, such as the birth mother’s level of education. The point is not to discourage adoption, but to ensure that prospective parents go into it with their eyes wide open. As it is, too many adoption stories end with “Happily Ever After” just as the real journey is beginning.”

These circumstances might be well known to the Russian adoption agencies because they might be well familiar with their natural parents’ medical, psychiatric, and legal histories, but they deliberately do not disclose these histories, which definitely are the significant genetic factor in these children’s development.

These children are used as the time bombs, the weapons against America and against their adoptive parents and families, sometimes causing them the great harm and misfortune. Do not warm up the snakes on your breast.

“Moscow knows it’s outgunned in a trade war. It generally fights back by using its own market as a weapon, whether by imposing sanctions on European food imports in 2014 or, in a more cynical moment in 2013, by banning Americans from adopting Russian children (Trump discussed the adoption ban, and probably the associated sanctions, with Putin during an after-dinner meeting at the G-20 summit in Hamburg this month).”

The way the American Democracy handles the “Trump Crisis”: measured, fair, truth and roots seeking, etc., etc., proves that it is a viable, strong, and self-sustaining institution, and I have no doubts that it will resolve and overcome this crisis and will come out of it stronger. In the end, it will enhance the security of the country and, do not be surprised, the global security. “What does not kill us, makes us stronger“. Hopefully, it will not kill us.

D. Hoffman claims, in his op-ed “The Russians Were Involved. But It Wasn’t About Collusion“, that in his “Operation Trump” Putin wanted to create turmoil and to prove that he is a worthy rival. I would argue that none of these goals would be as valuable to him as the genuinely good relations with the US, therefore this reasoning suggests the possibility of the third party or parties, who were just as interested in humiliating America as the Russians were, but were also interested, and maybe even more so, in humiliating and ridiculing the Russians themselves, by using them as their patsies and presenting them as the idiots, and also planting and enhancing the level of hostility between US and Russia.

The candidates for this role of the secret demiurge are not that many; and, in the order of probability, might include the Germans, the Israelis, the Chinese, or the others, and all or none of the above. Go figure!

I think we are witnessing the continuing process of transformation of the Trump Presidency into the National Security Presidency under Trump, which is his only rational choice and his only salvation, that’s how it looks like. Unless he sabotages them in a self-defeating fashion. The military people saved him in his adolescence, and they can save him now if only he cooperates and plays the game, which he is willing to do.

The “failing or rising New York Times” complained just shortly prior to Mr. Kelly’s appointment as Trump’s chief of staff:

“But it’s unlikely that the generals will consistently rein in Mr. Trump at the strategic level. Gen. Joseph Dunford Jr., the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and therefore, on paper at least, the president’s primary military liaison and adviser, rarely has one-on-one meetings with Mr. Trump. Mr. Kelly, a former Marine general who had served as his secretary of homeland security and whom many had hoped would temper the president on immigration, apparently shares Mr. Trump’s policy views and seems disinclined to challenge him.

Relying on the generals was always a dubious, ad hoc plan prompted by Mr. Trump’s uniquely troubling peculiarities. Generals aren’t supposed to make policy, let alone get involved in politics.”

Now, after this appointment, the realities and their perceptions might have changed. Some reality challenged and metaphorically inclined observers might even perceive this situation to be as close to the declaration of the military emergency as it can get in America, after the series of the continuing palace mini-coups. The others might see it as the encouraging signs of adjustment to reality, or perhaps, even the preventive security measures of the “deep state”. And for the third “camp”, it is nothing but the plain old fashioned common sense.

This is another example and the one more piece of evidence of how Germany plays the hypocritical double game, inserting itself in the US – Russia relations and deftly playing one side against the other, or rather playing its own tune, depending on the circumstances, and most definitely, playing her own side, and first of all minding her own interests. It’s “natural”, you might say. But not in these circumstances, when it looks and feels more unnatural and quite pre-meditated, pre-planned, possibly pre-manufactured, and more than suspicious.

Investigate the role of Germany in the “Trump affair” and the “Trump-Russia scandal” vigorously, objectively, and in-depth.

Said Mr. Rotunda: “As interesting as this debate is, it also strikes me as entirely premature. In my assessment, the “case” against Trump right now amounts to a mountain of innuendo built on a foundation of loose sand. The facts so far do not come close to making an obstruction case against the president, and for now there is no evidence that he engaged in any underlying crime.

If and when Mueller comes up with something that might create an indictable case, though, he is apt to run into serious questions about the limitations of his office, questions that Starr did not face.”

My Comment: The rules of evidence, in this case, are the subject to the Congressional opinions and decisions: if there is a will there is a way to base the mountain of facts on the solid foundation that would lead to the solid legal case and the indictment.

Putin thought that Trump can consolidate his power just like he did: by thumping on everyone and everything. No way, Wolodimir: it is a different country, different people, and different social and individual psychologies.

“It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God”, or for the shrewd Russian Mafiosi President to influence the kingdom of truth and liberties.

If this hypothetical causal connection, at least the circumstantial one, is demonstrated and investigated fully and properly, it might be one of the first cases of established association between the Russian government’s and the Russian Mafia’s retaliatory threats and the actual accidents.

In my humble opinion: Fight fire with fire: unleash the Italian Mafia on the Russian Mafia, they are the old rivals, and the “Cosa Nostra” lost in this competition. Italian Mafia is the lesser of these two evils: they do not have any government backing, as the Russian Mafia does; they never dared to challenge the US government and to interfere with the US system of elections and governing, and they can be dealt with to the mutual satisfaction at a later point.

Ann Applebaum: “I’m sure there will eventually be a lot more to say about the details of the Trump-Russia financial relationship. But this story should make us ponder some larger themes, too. After all, the double rise of Trump and Putin might have been halted if only Western governments and financial institutions had acted, over the past two decades, as if they truly believed that these kinds of dealings are wrong. Laws were not enforced — or did not exist. Blind eyes were turned.”

Donald Trump is perfectly “sane”. Which is not to say “normal” – in what way? Or “healthy” – how? He is “legally sane” on the basis of exclusion (he is not “insane – non compos mentis”) by the standards or criteria for the “legal insanity” (as defined by the Google Search), and by the standards, “measures”, and the “criteria” of his own and his milieu. Besides the legal ones, any other, e.g. “clinical”, definitions and standards in this situation are simply irrelevant and sound more like psychiatric-political name-calling rather than an attempt to establish a “diagnosis”, which in Psychiatry is a big unknown in and by itself.

At the same time, he is perfectly unfit to be the USA President, by the historical, social, political, moral, and psychological standards of this country and the significant proportion of its elites and populace. If voters decided at a certain historical point to elect him (leaving aside for the moment and for the purposes of this discussion the issue of legitimacy and the degree of “cleanliness” of this election), it does not necessarily mean that he is fit for this job. The voters, with all the due respect for the democratic concepts, made many historical errors in the past, and paid for them, and will do it again. The political behaviors of the “voting crowds”, with all its seeming “rationality of choice”, is just as irrational, immature, child-like, emotional, and even blind in its devotion to the leader, as any behaviors of any “crowds”; this is a feature of the “mass psychology” and the related phenomena. These issues, as we see it now, have the enormous practical implications and they have to be studied closely and objectively, “scientifically”. To make things even more complex and complicated, the Presidential “fitness” is a very relative phenomenon: everyone grows and changes on this job, and Mr. Trump obviously, makes his best efforts at adjustment. It is possible, to a degree, that this job, with its enormous, almost superhuman responsibilities, will make him into a different person. Possible, but not very likely. This possibility is also a subject to the relativeness of tones, shades, and hues.

It is much better to keep these two fields separate: not to “psychiatrize” politics, and not to “politicize” psychiatry. However, it does not mean, that we cannot use the psychoanalytic, psychological, and even the psychiatric knowledge, skills, and tools to understand the political phenomena better and deeper, and without examining the subject of the study directly or for the clinical purposes, which might be helpful but simply is not needed, is not feasible, and cannot be regarded as the reliable and proper source of information for the political-psychological evaluation purposes, with such an enormous wealth of the media reports about the President (and other political figures).

“The antidote to a dystopic Trumpean dark age is political, not psychological.”

Barry Goldwater wasn’t crazy. He was exceedingly conservative by the standards of his time—and that sometimes got him into trouble. In 1964, when he was running for the Republican presidential nomination, he suggested that maybe it wouldn’t be a terrible strategy to use just a few of the atomic bombs in the U.S. arsenal to defoliate forests in North Vietnam and give Americans a fighting edge. Was that extreme? Sure. Crazy? No. And, in the face of furious blowback, Goldwater was smart and sane enough to walk back his very bad idea.

That, however, didn’t stop the ironically named Fact magazine from running a sensational story with the provocative headline, “1,189 Psychiatrists Say Goldwater is Psychologically Unfit to Be President!” The story was junk: A questionnaire had been sent to 12,356 psychiatrists, nearly 10,000 of whom had simply ignored it. Of the 2,417 who did respond, a majority of 1,228 pronounced then-Senator Goldwater perfectly sane. The minority said he wasn’t — and the minority got the headline. Goldwater, who went on to win the GOP nomination only to get trounced by Lyndon Johnson, later sued the editor of Fact for libel, and he won. In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) responded by adopting what it straightforwardly called the Goldwater Rule, forbidding members from offering a diagnosis of a public figure they have not themselves examined — and even then, not without that person’s consent.

But that was then. And then was before the age of Donald Trump. It was before the early-morning tweetstorms, before the febrile conspiracy theories, before the grandiosity and impulsiveness and the serial counter-factualism. It was before, in short, Americans made a man who at least appears unstable to a great many observers the most powerful person in the world. That has led a lot of people to argue that we may have over-learned the lesson of the Goldwater Rule and that it’s time to scrap or at least suspend it.

That is precisely the position another professional group, the American Psychoanalytic Association(APsaA), has now taken. In an internal email, the association urged its 3,500 members to speak their minds on the matter of presidential mental health, and if they consider Trump unwell, to say so. According to the health and medicine website STAT, some members of the group have gone so far as to conclude that not only is it alright to weigh in on the matter of Presidential sanity, but that doctors have an affirmative “duty to warn.”

In an email to TIME, the APsaA stressed that it is not suggesting that its members “defy” the Goldwater Rule—especially since it is not their rule to begin with. In its official guidelines on public figures, the organization instead urges members to “avoid the appearance of ‘wild analysis,'” to avoid overstepping “the bounds of psychoanalytic knowledge” and generally to comment with extreme care. The American Psychiatric Association quickly made clear it stands by the Goldwater Rule.

By way of disclosure, more than three years ago, I opened my book, The Narcissist Next Door, with five pages devoted to Trump. It was not a diagnosis — I’m not a clinician — but it was a description, and I continue to believe it’s a good one. I also believe the psychoanalytic group is right to take the muzzle off its members.

Consider first that we live in a far more psychologically savvy era than we did even 30 years ago, to say nothing of half-a-century back in the Goldwater years. During the 1988 Presidential campaign, Michael Dukakis took a lot of heat from the GOP over the fact that he had sought psychological counseling after the 1973 death of his brother. Would voters care if a grieving sibling — presidential nominee or not — sought such help today? Not likely. America hasn’t necessarily gotten more compassionate, but we have gotten smarter, and we have a better understanding of the difference between routine mental health problems and a truly debilitating psychopathy. If the President — any President — exhibits signs of clinical illness, we’re better able to weigh the evidence and understand the implications.

What’s more, it doesn’t take professional training or particular insight to recognize that certain human behaviors are psychic red flags. If you can’t eat a meal without first washing your hands until they bleed, it would be fair for your family to suspect that you just might have OCD. If you can’t have a single drink without then having 15 more, it doesn’t take a clinician to suggest that you may — may — be an alcoholic. Presidents have exhibited worrisome behavior before: Johnson’s exhibitionism, Richard Nixon’s seeming paranoia. But they projected a fundamental groundedness too, a basic understanding that certain actions would lead to certain results, and an ability to pursue desired ends in a linear and disciplined way.

Finally, the Goldwater Rule, while masquerading as enlightened, actually betrays an outdated divide between physical and mental health. If President Dwight Eisenhower, who at one time had been a four-pack-a-day smoker, had shown any outward symptoms of cardiovascular disease before his 1955 heart attack, it’s unlikely anyone would have been reluctant to ask whether the 60-year-old veteran of a World War was up to campaigning for reelection. Certainly no one was reluctant after he did get sick. So why stay decorously silent when behavioral symptoms are just as obvious?

It’s indeed impossible for anyone but a professional who is treating Trump to say with certainty what his clinical diagnosis is — if any. But when the mental health of one man can have such a profound impact on the lives of 323 million Americans — to say nothing of the 7.5 billion people living on the planet as a whole — it’s irresponsible to not at least have the conversation. And it’s a dereliction for the people who know the most — the doctors — not to lead it.

“Oligarchs”, both foreign and domestic, are the weapons of Putin, who probably considers himself to be the “super-oligarch”, and therefore, maybe, a “superman”, too.

Putin made a practical correction into an old dogma: “The Oligarchs International”, not the Workers International, will rule the world. Very pragmatic indeed: if the idea of “Russia uber alles” did not go that well from the left side, why not to try it from the right side, to rock the Western boat a bit? Any instability for “them” is the extra stability for Russia and for “us”, is his logic.

The wrong and twisted logic, it seems to me, and for a variety of reasons.

My personal (and I would guess, many other people’s as well) impression, at the time of these events and now, is that Abedin-Weiner emails affair was the FBI “sting operation” (inspired by the foreign – Russian?! – actors?!), conceived and conducted with the clear political purpose of discrediting Mrs. Clinton.

“What better way to keep the ball rolling then some sort of sting operation, to get access to Huma. I Feel something we aren’t being told is going on behind the scenes, and this just a cover story for what is really happening.”

The information about the “Weinergate” on the Internet includes the significant amount of the blatant disinformation, with the interpretation of the events turned in the directly diametrical, opposite direction and repositioned upside down from the feet to the head. This style suggests that this disinformation might be of the foreign origin, which indicates the importance of these issues and events for the hypothetical foreign operators.

“A Scandal Exposed by Patriots to Prevent a Clinton Presidency… Just like Watergate, Operation Weinergate was implemented by those closest to the Democratic nominee… Counter-Coup by White Knights in the Intelligence Community in Progress…
It ought to be apparent to any observer that this entire string of scandals was manufactured by those who wished to send a message — LOUD & CLEAR — to the Clinton clan that their time is up. The very same message was delivered to the Bush Crime Family by Donald Trump, whereupon Jeb Bush quickly exited the presidential race.”

The former FBI officials, besides its acting members, such as Mr. Kallsrom, and the persons very close to the FBI, such as R. Giuliani, most likely know much more about it than we do, or probably even more than the Congress knows at this point. I think, in my humble opinion, that the Abedin-Wiener emails affair and the circumstances around the October 28 Letter should absolutely be the subject of the investigation by Inspector General Michael Horowitz and other active investigative bodies. This aspect could shed some light on the issue of undue, politicized FBI’s involvement in the elections.

Anthony Weiner was one of the first persons who mentioned the connection between the Trump’s financial difficulties and his ties to the Russian mafia and the oligarchs, and the Weiner’s troubles and the blown out of proportions “scandal” started soon after these public revelations. Please, read my previous posts on these subject and do your own research also.

“The reason he loves Putin, we know this now. The banks no longer loan him money because he’s a terrible risk. So he goes to these (Russian) oligarchs and borrows money. He knows the end game is coming for him. He’s thinking about who he wants to ingratiate himself (with). We have a presidential candidate who is literally kind of approaching Russia on his knees because he needs them to loan him money.”

This presumed “sting operation” against Weiner might be viewed as an attempt to silence Weiner by the FBI and to prevent the public airing of Weiner’s opinions about Trump and his connections with the Russian oligarchs.

Disclose the parts of the FBI’s Anthony Weiner file under the FOA which are relevant to this subject!

Now Weiner is bound by the FBI’s gag rule, as the condition of his sentence. Rescind this condition, and let him testify openly and fully. These issues are too important for the investigation and for the future directions of the corrective measures to disregard or omit them, they should be the important part of Mr. Horowitz’ activities and report.

Investigate the “investigators”!

Save America!

Reform the FBI!

_________________________

Links

Inspector General Michael Horowitz is expected to make his first public statements about the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General’s little-noticed investigation looking into several key issues in the Russia saga stretching back to before President Trump’s inauguration when he appears before the Senate Judiciary Committee today, Josh Gerstein reports at POLITICO.

Inspector General Michael Horowitz has offered few public indications of the status of his probe, which some lawmakers said he initially told them was expected to be complete by early next year | J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo

Amid criminal and congressional Russia inquiries, Justice’s internal watchdog is quietly running its own review of issues linked to last year’s election.

With special prosecutor Robert Mueller’s criminal inquiry into Russian meddling in the 2016 election now well underway and at least four congressional probes ongoing, it may seem like every aspect of the controversy is already being closely scrutinized.

But there’s also a less-noticed investigation by the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General, which has been exploring several issues key to the Russia saga since before President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

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Inspector General Michael Horowitz has offered few public indications of the status of his probe, which some lawmakers said he initially told them was expected to be complete by early next year. On Wednesday, he’s likely to make his first public statements at a hearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee about the status of his inquiry – and whether he’ll acquiesce to any of the many requests from Republicans and Democrats to expand his review to include the firing of former FBI director James Comey or other developments.

“I think he’ll find a way to engage with the committee on that, while still being a little bit cagey,” said Michael Bromwich, who served as Justice’s inspector general from 1994 to 1999.

About a week before Trump’s inauguration in January, Horowitz announced a multi-faceted probe, focused primarily on whether Comey acted properly in his handling of the FBI’s investigation into classified information found in Hillary Clinton’s private email account.

The inquiry has examined Comey’s decision to make a public statement about the closure of the investigation in July 2016 and to send politically explosive notices to Congress about developments in the case just before Election Day.

Horowitz also announced a determination to try to get to the bottom of election-season leaks from the FBI and the Justice Department, as well as claims that FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe’s judgement in the email probe and other matters may have been tainted by financial support his wife received in a state Senate race from Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D-Va.), a longtime Clinton backer.

Trump has raised that issue repeatedly in recent months, including in tweet on Tuesday morning.

“Problem is that the acting head of the FBI & the person in charge of the Hillary investigation, Andrew McCabe, got $700,000 from H for wife!” the president wrote.

In recent months, Horowitz—an Obama appointee who previously worked in top roles at the Justice Department under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush—has been on the receiving end of a slew of letters from lawmakers and interest groups, asking him to expand the scope of the inspector general inquiry.

In February, the then-chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), and the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), asked Horowitz to look into leaks of classified intelligence intercepts about National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.

In March, several Senate Democrats led by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) asked the inspector general to explore Attorney General Jeff Sessions decision to recuse himself from the Trump-Russia inquiry.

In May, Chaffetz asked the inspector general to investigate Trump’s firing of Comey.

And last month, more than 30 House Democrats asked Horowitz to consider whether Sessions violated the terms ofhis recusal by taking part in Comey’s dismissal.

“One of the first things an IG has to do when lawmakers want you to jump is to figure out how high to jump,” said Bromwich, who runs the Bromwich Group consulting firm and is senior counsel at law firm Robbins Russell. “You’ve got to make careful discriminating judgements about what you do. I think Horowitz and his staff will make individual judgements about what is fairly included or can be fairly included without taking him down a rabbit trail.”

A spokesman for Horowitz declined to comment this week and has repeatedly rebuffed questions about the status of his inquiry. In a recent letter obtained by POLITICO, the inspector general alludes to the possibility that Mueller’s May 17 appointment as special counsel could impact and perhaps even limit what the Justice Department’s permanent internal watchdog office can do.

Horowitz’s letter, sent to Democratic senators more than four months after their request on Sessions’ recusal, notes that Justice has “appointed a Special Counsel to investigate allegations regarding the Russian government interference in the 2016 Presidential election and related matters.”

“We are continuing to assess what, if any, additional review would be appropriate for the OIG to undertake and will update you as appropriate,” Horowitz wrote on July 14, days before he was first scheduled to testify to Senate Judiciary.

The inspector general’s response raises the question of whether Mueller and Horowitz are coordinating and whether the inspector general may be asked to step back in certain areas while given the green light in others.

A spokesman for Mueller declined to comment for this story. Horowitz’s comments at the hearing may also give hints into what Mueller is up to.

For instance, it seems certain that Comey’s firing is now under examination by Mueller, but it’s less clear whether the special prosecutor will seek to explore in detail Comey’s explanations for his actions in the Clinton email probe.

“Some of the details of the probe now seem to overlap at least somewhat with what Mueller is doing,” Bromwich said. “I’m sure they’ve talked and Mueller’s criminal investigation would take preeminence and I’m sure Michael will defer to some extent to him.”

At a hearing just days before he was fired, Comey said he welcomed the inspector general investigation into his decisions.

“Yes, I’ve been interviewed. The Inspector General’s inspecting me look and looking at my conduct in the course of the e-mail investigation, which—I know this sounds like a crazy thing to say—I encourage,” Comey told the Senate Judiciary Committee on May 3.

Comey also pointed to one key feature of an inspector general inquiry: unlike a criminal investigation, it traditionally culminates in a public report.

“I want that inspection because…I want my story told because some of its classified but, also, if I did something wrong, I want to hear that. I don’t think I did, but, yes, I’ve been interviewed and I’m sure I’ll be interviewed again,” the then-FBI chief said.

At a committee meeting in May, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said Horowitz had assured his staff that the investigation would move forward, despite the fact that Comey’s dismissal obviated the possibility of any punishment for violating department policies or regulations.

“Through my staff, I had conversations because we had heard that because of Comey going that he might not continue that investigation,” the Iowa senator told colleagues. “He’s informed me that he was going to continue the investigation and, if there was any attempt to stop him from continuing that investigation, he’s going to let the whole world know.”

Who cares about the American Psychiatric (not Psychoanalytic, please read the previous posts and news) Association, its “ethics committee”, its “Goldwater rule”, its prescriptions and its proscriptions, its stupidity, and its little nincompoopy membership?! Just disband them, they push themselves more and more into the utter irrelevance.

American Psychoanalytic Association, a much more authoritative body, said very clearly: discussions on political matters, including the subject of the Presidents mental health issues, is not a matter of clinical practice, and therefore cannot be regulated by the ethical rules pertaining to the clinical practice.

July 6th, 2017
Dear Colleagues,
A poll of the Executive Councilors was undertaken June 19-23 after the Austin annual
meeting. Executive Councilors were asked to comment on two things: whether they
endorse the policy that APsaA as an organization speaks to sociopolitical issues only, not
about specific political figures; and whether they support a poll of the membership to
further assess whether the Association should take a public stance on persons.
The poll yielded the following results: 78% of Councilors replied; 100% endorsed the
policy that APsaA as an organization will speak to issues only, not about specific political
figures; 79% opposed a poll of the membership.
The Executive Committee reviewed these results today and decided based on the data not
to survey the membership. APsaA will continue to speak to issues about which it has
something relevant to say.
However, it is important to note that members of APsaA are free to comment about
political figures as individuals. The American Psychiatric Association’s ethical stance
on the Goldwater Rule applies to its members only. APsaA does not consider political
commentary by its individual members an ethical matter. APsaA’s ethical code
concerns clinical practice, not public commentary.
Recent political discussion within our APsaA online communities has broadened to include
diverse opinion. A respectful openness to different points of views is a welcome and
encouraging shift in the direction of the Community Vision that Council unanimously
endorsed in Austin.

The American Psychiatry is nothing without its Psychoanalytic tradition and its depth. Psychopharmacology does not explain the human soul, and it does not even attempt to. Psychoanalysis does not explain it either, but at least it does attempt to, and searches for its “royal roads”, although very often it is simply lost on the old side streets. At least the Psychoanalysis retained its intellectual independence, as exemplified in its stand on the so called “Goldwater rule“.

“The APA was once the leader in psychiatric medicine—now it too is a joke; compromised beyond measure. For the APA and the DSM, it is clear. If you get enough votes, you can negate, soften, redefine, and ultimately legitimize any of the mental disorders. With enough votes you can turn a disorder into a disability or by elimination, like a magician’s trick and a snap of the fingers, “you’ve just become plain normal.””

Apparently, as I have good reasons to believe, at least until very recently, the American Psychiatric Association was led, run, and governed by the FBI informant at its very top (its former “President”, Carol Bernstein, who is nothing more than the mediocre, treacherous, double-dealing nincompoop, hungry for power). It degenerated and degraded into the total and complete irrelevance and impotence in scientific and the organizational matters. Very logical and even unavoidable outcome in these circumstances.

Investigate this in depth. Clean up and reform the American Psychiatry and the APA (Association).

An expert panel has released a new report containing recommendations to rectify the severe shortage of psychiatrists and the dearth of mental health services in the United States.

Released by the National Council Medical Director Institute, which advises the National Council for Behavioral Health on issues strongly related to clinical practice, the report, The Psychiatric Crisis: Causes and Solutions, contains a wide-ranging set of recommendations that touch on every area of the specialty, including training, funding, and models of care delivery.

Lead authors Joe Parks, MD, medical director, National Council for Behavioral Health, and Patrick Runnels, MD, co-chair, Medical Director Institute, discussed the report’s recommendations at a press briefing on March 28, where they were joined by Saul M. Levin, MD, CEO and medical director of the American Psychiatric Association (APA).

The number of psychiatrists is plummeting – down by 10% from 2003 to 2013. The average age of practicing psychiatrists is the mid-50s, compared to the mid-40s for other specialties, said Dr Parks.

Furthermore, approximately 55% of counties across the United States currently have no psychiatrist, and 77% report a severe shortage – a situation that is partially due to an increase in demand.

“People want psychiatric services. They know treatment works, and it’s less stigmatizing than it used to be, so people are more willing to accept and seek treatment,” said Dr Parks.

But their search is often in vain. Two thirds of primary care physicians report having trouble getting psychiatric services for patients, so patients often end up in the emergency department.

“There has been a 42% increase in patients going to ERs for psychiatric services in the past 3 years, but most of them aren’t staffed with psychiatrists,” Dr Parks noted.

“So people end up stuck in the ERs for hours and at times days – two to three times as long as for general medical conditions.”

To make matters worse, some hospitals are closing inpatient psychiatric units because they cannot find psychiatrists to staff and run them.

The lack of services and long wait times for these scarce services are taking a toll on patients.

“These are people burdened and suffering from anxiety, from depression. Some of them feel suicidal, and some of them have hallucinations,” said Dr Parks.

Psychiatrist Burnout

Psychiatry has not received the increase in support that some other specialties, such as obstetrics and gynecology, have. Psychiatrists also do not get the same ancillary staff to assist them in tasks such as arranging patient follow-up, he added.

In many cases, psychiatrists are forced to receive reimbursement that is lower than usual. “About 40% of psychiatrists are in cash-only services. Psychiatrists are rushed, and they burn out and leave the profession earlier,” said Dr Parks.

He described the current mental health care delivery system as “old fashioned,” noting that it “has not kept up with modern, data-driven, evidence-based technologies and has certainly not taken advantage of some of the new, innovative social media ways we can reach out and touch patients.”

Another “looming potential problem” is immigration. Some 50% of new psychiatry trainees are foreign medical graduates, and changes in visa requirements by the Trump administration could add to the workforce problems, he said.

If nothing is done about the psychiatrist shortage, the demand for psychiatry is expected to outstrip supply by 25% by 2025.

Becoming a psychiatrist requires 12,000 hours of training, said Dr Levin, who heads the APA, the largest psychiatric association in the world.

According to Dr Runnels, medical students are more likely to opt for a psychiatry residency if the medical school’s psychiatric department offers a highly-rated and relatively long rotation.

“That’s hugely important, and medical schools need to start working on that,” he said. He added that currently, many training “milestones” are “fuzzily or not well-defined.”

Training does not adequately address team-based collaborative care or supervision of clinicians from other disciplines, for example, physician assistants, said Dr Runnels.

“Medication-assisted treatment for addictions is definitely something that most residents get very little exposure to,” he added.

New Models of Care

The expert panel that developed the report included representatives from all areas of healthcare. In addition to psychiatrists, it included CEOs of healthcare organizations, primary and managed care representatives, academic experts, and those representing related professions, such as nursing.

The panel was tasked to develop recommendations that were “specific and actionable – not broad, vague, pie in the sky but things that a payer could do, things that government could do, things that individual psychiatrists could do, and things that the professional organizations could do to relieve this emergency,” said Dr Parks.

The expert panel recommended that the care delivery system be updated so that psychiatrists would operate more as expert consultants and work in teams, said Dr Parks.

“So they would do the essential things only psychiatrists can do and delegate other parts of care and follow-up for patients who are stable, or services that can be provided by other professionals, such as psychiatric nurses or perhaps physician assistants.”

The panel also recommended new and advanced forms of treatment, such as collaborative care and telepsychiatry.

“We should all be advocating for new, innovative models of care, such as telepsychiatry, which can increase access to specialty psychiatric services across the country,” said Dr Levin.

“We would love to see more telepsychiatry, and we would love to see the payment system actually pay for it,” he added. However, he said, it is important to ensure that patients who receive treatment remotely are “always safe” and that if they begin to show signs and symptoms of distress on the psychiatry call, “we are able to get them help very quickly.”

The APA has a toolkit to help educate psychiatrists and other healthcare providers on how to practice telepsychiatry, said Dr Levin. “I think we all see this as one of the ways we are going to be practicing well into the future.”

The panel also wants to see burdensome governmental rules removed. For example, said Dr Parks, a psychiatrist who provides telepsychiatry services in eight states now has to be licensed in all eight states.

As for medical education, the task force recommended that all residents receive integrated care experience and be placed in a range of different settings to broaden their experience with medication-assisted treatment programs and collaboration with other professions.

Cost-Saving Investment

All of this requires additional funding, which the panel also addressed.

“We are aware that overall, the healthcare system is looking to cut costs, so we want to point out that our call for increased funding for psychiatry was not something we took lightly,” said Dr Runnels.

“However, we want people to understand that our call for increased funding is about helping to save money overall.”

He pointed out that the use of psychiatry services leads to overall reductions in spending on healthcare.

“We believe insurance companies are leaving money on the table by not adequately funding those services.”

Some of the report’s specific recommendations include the following:

Removing barriers to integrated care: Fund technical assistance programs that help develop alternatives to fee-for-service reimbursement models, because chronic physical conditions are known to improve when mental health conditions are managed, particularly among high-risk populations.

Cutting red tape: Streamline administrative paperwork so that physicians can spend more time with patients and that information exchanges between physicians are more attuned to the patients’ needs.

Changing how psychiatrists are paid: Create awareness about behavioral health’s role in the total cost of care, then shift from fee-for-service arrangements to bundled payments to increase the quality of care and reduce the overall cost of care.

Improving confidentiality regulations: Although the recently revised 42 CFR Part 2 confidentiality regulations are advances, they burden psychiatrists by restricting information regarding treatment of substance use disorder, sometimes keeping patients and their families in the dark to protect psychiatrists.

The authors of the report made other recommendations specific to government and payers, healthcare treatment, and advocacy organizations, as well as nurse practitioners, physician assistants, and other stakeholders. The full report is available for download.

Dr Glass is a psychoanalyst and Associate Professor of Psychiatry (Part-time) … Since 1973, the American Psychiatric Association’s (APA) Code of Ethics … for a psychiatrist to offer a professional opinion unless he or she has …

… mental health professionals even outside the purview of the APA that much of … Unlike in the U.S., the cross-pollination of psychoanalysis, social reform, … theorist and one-time head of the AmericanPolitical Science Association, … the Goldwater Rule or our own historical reluctance to share our clinical …

On Tuesday 35 U.S. psychiatrists, psychologists and social workers … and director of the Seattle Psychoanalytic Society and Institute, says she was … how a person’s mental health may affect other people and his or her ability to perform. … the association pointed to a letter published by APApresident Maria …

A psychiatry group told its members they can comment on the mental health of President Trump—going against the longstanding so-called Goldwater Rule, a self-imposed code that prevents the psychiatry community from commenting on the mental health of public figures.

In an email, the American Psychoanalytic Association told its 3,500 members they don’t have to abide by the Goldwater Rule, which states that mental health professionals should not discuss the mental state of someone they have not personally evaluated, Stat News reported on Tuesday.

“We don’t want to prohibit our members from using their knowledge responsibly,” Prudence Gourguechon, past president of the association, told Stat News.

The debate over whether health professionals can comment on Trump’s mental faculties has raged since the president was elected, with several mental health experts arguing that the Goldwater Rule needs more flexibility regards to Trump. An online petition that calls Trump “mentally ill,” started by psychiatrist John Gartner, has received more than 55,000 signatures since April.

Despite the note from the American Psychoanalytic Association, the American Psychiatric Association—which has more than 37,000 members — said on Tuesday that it continues to stand by the Goldwater Rule.

The Goldwater Rule stems from a controversy in 1964, when Fact magazine reported that more than 1,000 mental health professionals said they believed that then-Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater was not mentally fit for office. Goldwater successfully sued Fact for libel after he lost the election, leading to the rule’s addition to the American Psychiatric Association’s ethics guidelines.

The American Psychoanalytic Association did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

What do you see in this lady’s deep blue eyes? In this middle of the bold and crude, tabloid, poster-like, placard-like strokes of colors and facial expressions, without many shades and quarter-tones, ironically, bacchanallically and warhol-lically spiritually impoverished, almost empty, and intriguing in their near-emptiness? I see just hypocrisy poorly disguised as “humanity”.Her stare is beautiful, charming, engaging, pulling to like and love her, but it is empty, in all its alluring attacking charm.

I suspect, that the artist, whose style was described as “the idealization and stylization of known celebrities”, was well paid for her artistic mastery of disguise, which cannot really hide the crude, artificially over-sweetened, commercial, superficial, cheap, lying, showy sentimentality. It looks like the famed German propaganda machine is in a full up-swing mode. “If you repeat a lie often enough, people will believe it, and you will even come to believe it yourself”, Goebbels said. If you exaggerate the lie ad absurdum and artfully, they and you might eventually believe it too.

“However, as the documents show, the BND had in the past no inhibitions to tap government facilities in Washington. The US Treasury Department, the US Department of State, and even the White House, were on the nick list.

The German foreign secret service also pegged telephone, facsimile and e-mail addresses of American companies such as Lockheed Martin, the Nasa space agency, the human rights organization Human Rights Watch and universities in several federal states. Similarly, the BND’s connections with military installations such as the US Air Force, the Marine Corps, or the Defense Intelligence Agency , the military secret service of the American armed forces,

The BND spies also received follow-up data from well over one hundred foreign embassies in Washington, from institutions such as the International Monetary Fund or the Washington office of the Arab League.”

Would you trust the person in this portrait? I wouldn’t. Is she really a person or a well tuned, calculating political mechanism, painted over, for her own political reasons, with these absurdly deep, incredible, helpless, domineering, loving, so feminine, and so mysterious German-Russian blue eyes?

Some other interpretations of the same subject, just in case if you did not notice them, are here.

By the way, do you think that with such the astonishing audacity, reach, breadth and depth of the German surveillance activities and penetration (the very important questions in these circumstances about the degree of the German infiltration of the US Intelligence and Security services, and the FBI first of all, remain essentially and quite conveniently unasked and unanswered), as they were described in these recent German spying episodes, the German Intelligence was not informed in details about Trump-Russia activities, affair, and scandal, especially given the situation with and around the Deutsche Bank?

But the most intriguing questions areif the German Intelligence itself was involved in the planning and the execution of this affair from the beginning, using the Russians and the others as their unwitting patsies, and laughing at them in the process. This is the more likely explanation for this tragicomedy, with all its funny incongruencies. It looks like the German historical revenge for their historical loss in the WWII, and the very convenient way to drive the wedge between two former allies and the Germany’s conquerors.

And there are some signs that the German Intelligence (with its long standing and deep roots buried and alive within the American society) might have been very much involved in this affair, and still very much is. The traditional benefits of the “plausible deniability” were most likely provided to the Madam Chancellor by her faithful Intelligence servants.

“Chancellor Angela Merkel, who took office in 2005, recently denied she had any knowledge of BND’s foreign spying operations.

“I assumed that the BND does not engage in such activities,” Merkel told a parliamentary enquiry Feb. 17. “It’s a waste of effort and energy.””

Apparently, some of her colleagues in the German Government and power structures have a directly opposite opinion on this subject.

Doesn’t the whole situation remind you the old tale about the peasant and the snake that he saved?

“In pity he brought the poor Snake
To be warmed at his fire. A mistake!
For the ungrateful thing
Wife & children would sting.
I’have known some as bad as the Snake.”

Mr. Putin, dispensing his valuable educational instructions for the political novice Trump, as recorded by the “KGB fly on the wall”, shared the conventional political wisdom, which might be applicable for a variety of uses:

“Putin: I like you, tovarich. But listen to me. You are new to this political business. I have been in the trenches for a long time, and I have learned things. We have an old saying in Russia. It goes: Little thieves are hanged, but the great ones escape. Your mistake was that you appointed your hangman, gave him the rope, and now he is going to hang you.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel was famously outraged in 2013 when she heard that the U.S. had allegedly bugged her phone, telling then-President Barack Obama: “Spying between friends, that’s just not done.”

But Germany’s foreign intelligence service spent years spying on American public and private sector targets, a report in the German news magazine Der Spiegel claimed Thursday.

The magazine said that it had seen evidence suggesting German security agency the BND had used almost 4,000 keywords in internal surveillance databases that related to American targets from 1998 to 2006. These included White House email addresses as well as phone and fax numbers, as well as the U.S. Department of State and Treasury.

Other targets included the US Air Force, the Marine Corps, the engineering company Lockheed Martin, space agency NASA, several universities and the NGO Human Rights Watch, Spiegel reported.

German spies also accessed data from more than 100 foreign embassies in Washington, according toDie Zeit.

The findings are likely to prove embarrassing for the German government at a time when U.S.-German relations are already strained following forceful remarks by President Donald Trump about trade and tariffs on German industries, and an awkward meeting between the president and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in March.

The BND declined to comment on the reports, but its president, Bruno Kahl, did address the organization’s future oversight, according to Deutsche Welle.

“The question concerning who can scout the BND and who cannot does not just depend on increasing authorization for lawmakers, but also implementing an ambitious series of controls,” he said.

Merkel earlier this year said to a parliamentary committee looking into the actions of America’s National Security Agency (NSA) that she did not know about any BND spying in the U.S.

Another report in Spiegel this April said that the BND also spied on Interpol, the international crimefighting agency, and in February the magazine said it had seen evidence that the agency had accessed phones, faxes and emails of several news organizations, including the New York Times and Reuters.

Late-night hosts discussed the president’s feud with George Conway and reviewed the long list of 2020 candidatesLate-night hosts took aim at the president’s Twitter feud with Kellyanne Conway’s husband and summarised the state of the 2020 race.Tweet Fighter: Kellyanne’s Husband vs. Kellyanne’s Boss pic.twitter.com/dYyDxfQy4Z Related: Trevor Noah on Boeing: ‘How was a self-crashing plane allowed […]